Policy adminstration

Most insurance technology executives will tell you that navigating their way to the executive suite is, at the least, a rewarding experience. This adage is true for men and women, but in the male-dominated insurance industry, women tend to relish the ride.

Have you ever had to find a stud to hang a picture? You knew the stud was there ... somewhere ... beneath the surface, but you just couldn't find it without exhaustive searching. Finding studs is like locating knowledge management and knowledge personnel in today's insurance industry: You know they're there, but at first glance they're always hard to find.Around the time of the dot-com boom, knowledge management was one of the buzz-worthy trends infiltrating business and insurance circles. Formally established as a discipline in 1995, knowledge management, and the inception of the chief knowledge officer, had gained steam throughout the late 1990s, but fell off the radar almost completely once the bubble burst.

When INN's editors began research on the topic for this month's cover story, women in insurance industry IT leadership positions, they were charged with finding out how women are faring within the broader context of IT and management. That discovery process turned up some pretty negative press.The Journal, an online forum for educators on the value of teaching technology, quotes the National Center for Women & Information Technology's (NCWIT) research, which indicates an 80% decline in the number of female first-year college students who chose computer science as their field of study between 1996-2004. According to NCWIT, today, women make up only 26% of IT workers in the country.

Pre-retirees and retirees may produce immediate retirement planning profit for insurers, but Generations X and Y also need to start planning for retirement. So how do insurers focus on all generations? "Take a step back and develop a more client-centric approach," says David Schehr, a research director at Stamford, Conn.-based Gartner Inc. "An insurer's technology choice is a reflection of its business choice. There is a perception out there-and there is some reality behind the perception-that insurance organizations tend to approach retirement much as a product sale. In reality, the insurer should first determine its risk tolerance. If an annuity is appropriate, set goals in a retirement planning process. Ask all of the client-centric questions and, from there, if it's appropriate, develop an annuity illustration."SEPARATING THE GENERATIONS

STUDY: INSURERS NEED TO CHANGEU.S. consumers want insurance companies to more effectively communicate new products and services available to them, provide customized policies to better meet their needs and bring their customer experience up to par with other industries, according to a study by Armonk, N.Y.-based International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) of more than 3,000 P&C insurance policyholders.

Remember when Johnny Carson would become Karnack the Magnificent and answer the question before he opened the envelope holding the question? Well, here is the answer: You will save time and money and improve customer service as well as compliance. The question: What will Check 21 do for me?Congress enacted Check 21, or more formally known as Check Clearing for the 21st Century, in 2004 at the behest of the Federal Reserve. Recall that when 9/11 occurred, all aircraft were grounded and could not fly. The small planes that would fly checks from various cities to Federal Reserve locations as a part of the check clearing and settlement process were not exempt. As a result, the Federal Reserve decided to implement new processing rules and utilize technology, coining this process as Remote Deposit Capture (RDC), to digitize checks and remove the physical check from the clearing process.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that between 2004 and 2014, 1.49 million new computer- and IT-related jobs will be created.The retiring boomer generation may play a role in these figures, according to the Robert Half Technology 2007 Salary Guide. The guide, from Menlo Park, Calif.-based Robert Half Technology, reports that as many as 64 million baby boomers, representing more than 40% of the U.S. labor force, are poised to retire by the end of the decade.

The need for insurers to evolve in today's competitive marketplace is at an all-time high. Whether expanding to reach an untapped niche, or improving systems and practices just to keep the pace, carriers are constantly in need of setting goals and brainstorming effective ways of reaching them.One such company, New York-based XL Insurance, recognized a gaping hole in the U.S. casualty marketplace throughout the late 1990s and early 2000s and, in January 2004, made a strategic decision to swiftly expand into the casualty risk management business by offering a portfolio of risk-sensitive products. The impediment: limited internal resources and a rigid time frame in which to implement new solutions. And, for XL's rapid, creative and successful response to the problem, the company was named third-place winner of Insurance Networking News' 2007 INNovator award.

New technologies and competitive pressures are gradually prying open the doors to carriers' rating systems, long locked away in the silos of proprietary or homegrown systems. These rule-driven systems, designed to evaluate potential policyholder risk and price policies accordingly, are increasingly being called upon to integrate with multiple channels, back-end systems and front-end portals to provide real-time or close to real-time pricing for customers.These changes are being driven by a number of factors, relates Craig Weber, an analyst with Boston-based Celent LLC. Rising customer and agent expectations, for one, are pressuring carriers to provider faster, more accurate and more flexible quoting. In addition, there is continuing pressure to keep a lid on IT spending, causing carriers to look for more efficient solutions.

Mounting competition and market shifts are forcing property/casualty insurers to take a new look at core business processes.With an eye toward profitable growth and increased market share, carriers are now focusing on underwriting-an area long under-served by technology. Today, most underwriting is done through slow, error-prone manual processes or by outdated legacy applications. This inefficiency is driving down profits and eroding sales.

Windsor, Conn. and Atlanta — The boards of directors of LIMRA International Inc. and LOMA approved a proposal to unite two of the world's largest insurance and financial services trade organizations and will submit a recommendation to their members for a decisive vote."Bringing LIMRA and LOMA together will be good for the industry, our members and our dedicated employees who serve our members," says Robert Kerzner, president and chief executive officer of LIMRA. "Building on our well-established strengths, we can create a new and exciting organization with limitless possibilities to meet the industry's needs, whatever they may be, now and in the future."

New York — Richard Mucci will join New York Life International, New York Life Insurance Co.'s overseas arm with operations in eight markets, as chairman and chief executive officer of International on Oct. 8, 2007. He succeeds Joseph Gilmour, who decided to leave the company.

New York — The Guardian Insurance & Annuity Co. Inc. (GIAC), a wholly owned subsidiary of The Guardian Life Insurance Co. of America, New York, announced today that Boston-based DALBAR Inc. has awarded the company with the DALBAR Seal of Excellence for Transaction Processing for the third year in a row. The DALBAR Seal is only awarded to those firms that consistently exceed customer expectations for service levels.

Orlando, Fla. – Insurance carriers who make transient improvements and do not focus their resources on innovation and differentiation will meet with failure, according to Bill Pieroni, operations vice president for State Farm Insurance Co., Bloomington, Ill.

New York — Switzerland-based Zurich Financial Services Group named Kevin Dunham as senior vice president and global relationship leader for the Western region of its Global Corporate in North America business unit. Dunham is based in Glendale, Calif., and will manage accounts primarily in the Southwest and Western United States.

San Francisco—Insurance customers won't tolerate difficult navigating, endless loops that prevent transactions or other Web site challenges, according to survey results released by San Francisco-based Tealeaf Technology Inc. According to the survey, conducted by Rochester, N.Y.-based Harris Interactive Inc., about nine out of 10 consumers conducting transactions online (within a number of industries) have experienced problems. This year's survey highlights online consumer intolerance, as 42% of those who have experienced problems when conducting online transactions have switched to a competitor or abandoned the transaction entirely, and another 52% who have experienced bad customer service from a company's contact center, following an online issue, have completely stopped doing business with the company.

Detroit–Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan (BCBSM) says it plans a significant expansion of its health care electronic data interchange clearinghouse and portal.

Manchester, N.H. – Physicians in New Hampshire are being offered a variety of incentives to participate in a statewide e-prescribing program, the latest initiative by the Blue Cross Blue Shield organization designed to improve patient safety, control costs and reduce medication errors. Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in New Hampshire and the New Hampshire Citizens Health Initiative, created by Gov. John Lynch, launched a statewide electronic prescribing, or e-prescribing, program for every physician office in the Granite State, reports the insurer. This follows the announcement made in February by Blue Cross and Blue Shield (BCBS) of Illinois to expand its e-prescribing initiative throughout Illinois. In January, Anthem BCBS announced it would expand the effort in Ohio. Those efforts are ongoing. More than 3 billion prescriptions are written annually in the United States, with medication errors resulting in $77 billion in costs and 7,000 deaths per year (Institute of Medicine, 2006). Yet fewer than 22% of physicians nationwide use the basic capabilities of electronic prescribing, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). CMS estimates that the use of such technology could eliminate as many as 2 million harmful drug events each year. Electronic prescribing pilots have demonstrated that up to 2% of all prescriptions transmitted this way are changed before being administered to the patient because e-prescribing has alerted the physician to potential safety problems. E-prescribing enables a licensed practitioner to generate a prescription electronically, and then transmit it to a pharmacy. Through this new program, Anthem is offering physicians access to free e-prescribing software, a free mobile pocket PC and a discounted wireless telecommunication plan that will enable them to access real-time patient eligibility, formulary and medication history information from any Internet-enabled PC, or anywhere a cell phone signal is available. Physicians with these tools can write and renew prescriptions anytime, anywhere, for all of their patients, not just Anthem members. “Physicians will now have ample information at their fingertips to help them ensure the safety of their patients, to work more efficiently and to save their patients money on prescriptions,” says Lisa Guertin, president, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in New Hampshire. Last fall, Gov. Lynch announced his goal to make New Hampshire the first state in the nation where all prescribing health care providers are able to prescribe medication electronically. “Electronic prescribing will help ensure patients get the best possible medication to meet their needs. That will reduce medical errors, save lives and reduce health care costs,” he said. “That is why, working through the Citizens Health Initiative, I’ve made electronic prescribing a priority. This effort will help us meet our goals of making New Hampshire the first state in the nation where all health care providers are able to prescribe medication electronically.” The Anthem e-prescribing program, supported by Sprint and the National E-prescribing Patient Safety Initiative, will include access to a patient’s eligibility, formu aries, adverse drug event alerts and medication history, including medications prescribed by physicians outside of the practice. Most electronic medical record (EMR) systems have e-prescribing capability, however, to date, that technology has not been widely used, and often has not supported the ePrescribing process, reports the insurer. In addition to accessing e-prescribing via EMR systems, prescribers can use smart phone/personal digital assistant devices or stand-alone, Web-based applications. “Not only is this program expected to help reduce medical errors and improve patient safety by providing drug-specific information, it also will help eliminate confusion among drug names and improve communication between physicians and pharmacists,” says Elizabeth Malko, M.D., medical director, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in New Hampshire. The technology also will allow physicians to send new prescriptions to the pharmacy of the patient’s choice, as well as process refill requests from those same pharmacies. Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in New Hampshire is working with a number of organizations to implement the program, including: The New Hampshire Citizens Health Initiative National E-prescribing Patient Safety Initiative Sprint RxHub LLC, which is providing the technology infrastructure that supports the secure exchange of patient-specific prescribing information between physicians and pharmacy benefit managers, and the transmission of the electronic prescriptions to mail-order pharmacies; SureScripts, operators of the Pharmacy Health Information Exchange, which facilitates the electronic connection between community pharmacies and physicians; and Anthem’s pharmacy benefit management company, which plays a key role by helping to ensure physician access to information, including benefits, eligibility, formularies and medication history. Information about the program was mailed to all New Hampshire physicians in late August. Those who adopt the program will be provided with orientation and training from Anthem. Participating providers who enter into a two-year service agreement with Sprint also will receive a free hand-held device courtesy of Sprint (The HTC 6800 Windows Mobile Device). Sources: Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield, INN news archives

Washington – The Office of Management and Budget has released a “statement of administration policy” threatening a presidential veto of legislation aimed at extending the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act (TRIA).

Pearl River, N.Y.–Insurance standards association ACORD has chosen John Kellington as senior vice president.